Camelot Unchained - Beta incoming any time soon?

Hey folks, has there been any announcement as to when CU's beta will finally be released to backers? I know tons of people are dying to see what the game world and gameplay are really like. I know, I know, when it's ready. But is there any indication of when that will actually be? Google didn't have much to say about it.

In my day MMORPG's were so hard we fought our way through dungeons in the snow, uphill both ways.

Fools find no pleasure in understanding, but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV

Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon

"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator

Starvault's reponse to criticism related to having a handful of players as the official "test" team for a supposed MMO: "We've just have another 10ish folk kind enough to voulenteer added tot the test team" (SIC) This explains much about the state of the game :-)

Words are they're working very hard to get the game to beta 1 status. Pretty much they've been working on the tech side of the game for a long time, and they really want to jazz the game up and polish it for beta.

Unfortunately these past weeks they ran into some issues, so there hasn't even been an alpha test for a couple of weeks. But apparently some good came out of these issues. So we'll see.

I wouldn't be surprised to see beta this summer, but that's just my optimistic view based on what I've heard Mark say on the streams.

In my day MMORPG's were so hard we fought our way through dungeons in the snow, uphill both ways.

Fools find no pleasure in understanding, but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV

Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon

Goodness, were all these crowdfunded indie developers ambitious when they were first starting out. Is there one crowdfunded MMO of any significance that hasn't been drastically delayed? Not so easy to duplicate on a shoestring budget what the big studios did with huge bankrolls and teams of hundreds, I guess. I realize that developers always blamed publishers for breathing down their necks and rushing things out, but it seems that without that driving force, things fall literally years behind.

No announcement of a date nor even an announcement of a date to announce a date yet. Work on getting the game to beta continues at the same steady, methodical pace as always. When there is something to announce CSE will let everybody know.

I realize that developers always blamed publishers for breathing down their necks and rushing things out, but it seems that without that driving force, things fall literally years behind.

FYI delays are very common in software development, and even more so in games –sometimes it turns out that a gameplay-mechanic isn't fun-to-play or important parts of the engine are not as flexible/fast/modular as they be thought to be. Nearly every game has one or more bigger delays in the course of its development, but the thing is, in case of a AAA-game you wont hear of those delays, because they are announced when development is (nearly) finished.

Also, in some cases great ideas are extremely complicated to implement in the right way, hence publisher – as it's their money funding the game – cut them out and "rush" the game, which sometimes help the developers to 'get their shit together' and make a great game in the end (and therefor those cuts are never heard of) or the game is a flop, in which case the community starts 'digging'.

It seems like people forget how long it takes to make a game when you aren't simply modding existing assets sourced elsewhere, versus actually making it from nothing. WoW wasn't made in the 1 year press cycle it had. They worked on it for years before anyone even knew about it.

If no one knew about Camelot Unchained till last month and all of a sudden they announced beta within 6 months, no one would say anything about the time it took.

It seems like people forget how long it takes to make a game when you aren't simply modding existing assets sourced elsewhere, versus actually making it from nothing. WoW wasn't made in the 1 year press cycle it had. They worked on it for years before anyone even knew about it.

If no one knew about Camelot Unchained till last month and all of a sudden they announced beta within 6 months, no one would say anything about the time it took.

CSE decided to put december 2015 as estimated release date when they asked people to fund a portion of the game development. The discontentment comes primarily from that I guess. If they had put december 2019, those who would have backed would have known what to expect from the beginning and we wouldn't even talk about it. If you order a hamburger at the restaurant and the cook says it's going to take 10 minutes, but after 25 minutes you still haven't got it and the cook has been telling you 100 times that "it's coming soon!" [censored the rest of my little story ^_^]

On the Kickstarter page, I found this: Estimated delivery of Beta 1 Access: February 2015. If I am not mistaken (and I often am), CU has not yet entered Beta testing. Forgive me if I'm wrong about this, I Googled about CU being in Beta and didn't get many clear results. If they aren't at least in Beta 1, they are 2.5 years late on their original estimate.

I fully believe that the developers are working as hard as they can on this game. I also believe that they drastically underestimated the amount of time it would take to build an engine from scratch and develop the entire game. What other conclusions can you reasonably draw?

Considering how much things have been delayed, after giving the developers their money, it's not unreasonable for backers to be concerned or frustrated. I do believe the game will eventually be released, but if the development pace so far is any indication, it's a long way off. What CU has working in its benefit is that there are few new, decently funded MMOs in the works to challenge it when it does eventually release. For this type of experience, what else do we have to look forward to?

On the Kickstarter page, I found this: Estimated delivery of Beta 1 Access: February 2015. If I am not mistaken (and I often am), CU has not yet entered Beta testing. Forgive me if I'm wrong about this, I Googled about CU being in Beta and didn't get many clear results. If they aren't at least in Beta 1, they are 2.5 years late on their original estimate.

It's the case, but as you pointed out, they're late based on their own original pre-production estimate, rather than "objectively" late. Another comparable project (e.g. Darkfall, which was PvP centric, created by a team about the size of CSE, built their engine from scratch like CSE, etc.) took +10 years in total from the beginning of development to release. So 6-7 years to build something as complex as CU isn't extraordinary long or alarming. It really takes that long to create an innovative MMO with a relatively small team in the west. And it's even longer if the devs don't know what they're doing (fortunately, in our case, Mark is extremely exigent when it comes to hiring the finest developers).

I fully believe that the developers are working as hard as they can on this game. I also believe that they drastically underestimated the amount of time it would take to build an engine from scratch and develop the entire game. What other conclusions can you reasonably draw?

Agreed on both counts. It's hard to know exactly if it was 100% genuine estimates or if they decided to put a date that seemed not too far away so they can reach the KS goal more easily. Only CSE knows I guess. What I know however is that I regularly tell people that I'll do X task in about an hour, and 2 hours later it's still not completed. Not because I'm lazy or I lied, rather because I'm optimistic and plans often don't go exactly as planned. It's even worse when I'm doing something for the first time since it's impossible to estimate accurately based on previous experiences. And it's exactly what happened to CSE: afaik they haven't built an engine previously for a MMO (WAR and DAoC used existent tech if I'm correct), nor built games with such complexity : 1,000 players battle may seem simple when we think about it, but it's actually the number one most complicated thing to pull off in a video game and nobody achieved it to this day the way CU envisions it. Server-side physics, real-time destruction of structures, moving islands, procedurally-generated environment (that looks good, not just bland boring repetitive trees and rocks), ability system with components, usage-based progression for skills, etc. Nobody created something as complex yet. So it was impossible to know during pre-production how long it would take imo. But they surely could have been less optimistic with their original estimates.

Considering how much things have been delayed, after giving the developers their money, it's not unreasonable for backers to be concerned or frustrated. I do believe the game will eventually be released, but if the development pace so far is any indication, it's a long way off. What CU has working in its benefit is that there are few new, decently funded MMOs in the works to challenge it when it does eventually release. For this type of experience, what else do we have to look forward to?

True, and I understand the backers who are frustrated and those who request refunds. And yea it's going to take a long while still. But it's not that bad imo because as you point out there's no real competitors, except maybe unannounced AAA titles but I doubt it. And also because the Betas are going to be a lot of fun in CU, so even if it takes a long time for release, I don't really care, as long as we can have fun sieging, PvPing, crafting, exploring, socializing, etc. during Betas. And it's about to start (edit: "the fun" is about to start, Beta idk, but Beta is just an appellation and "late Alpha" can be just as fun).

As others have said... the point that sets CU apart is that they offer refunds. Delays suck, but unlike other games like the recently delayed CoE, you can get your money back if you think the delay is unreasonable or you lose interest.

"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator

Starvault's reponse to criticism related to having a handful of players as the official "test" team for a supposed MMO: "We've just have another 10ish folk kind enough to voulenteer added tot the test team" (SIC) This explains much about the state of the game :-)

Hey folks, has there been any announcement as to when CU's beta will finally be released to backers? I know tons of people are dying to see what the game world and gameplay are really like. I know, I know, when it's ready. But is there any indication of when that will actually be? Google didn't have much to say about it.

beta's will for surely start in 2018. and we aren't near star citizen territory yet. besides. Mark has a good background/experience with these games, so we know when it rolls out its gonna be grand. so its definitely worth waiting until 2018 for beat & live.

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Hey folks, has there been any announcement as to when CU's beta will finally be released to backers? I know tons of people are dying to see what the game world and gameplay are really like. I know, I know, when it's ready. But is there any indication of when that will actually be? Google didn't have much to say about it.

beta's will for surely start in 2018. and we aren't near star citizen territory yet. besides. Mark has a good background/experience with these games, so we know when it rolls out its gonna be grand. so its definitely worth waiting until 2018 for beat & live.

In my day MMORPG's were so hard we fought our way through dungeons in the snow, uphill both ways.

Fools find no pleasure in understanding, but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV

Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon

Was it a mistake to make the company's home state Virginia? Yes, but at least they've remedied that now. I don't feel like 5 years to write the game from nothing is that bad if they are offering something the rest of the market still can't. As far as I'm aware according to recent tests that is still the case.

If I had to personally guess, I think beta will be sometime around November/December with a launch near Summer 2018. That's assuming there's no more issues that come up after new visual effects are added.

I understand people being upset they can't play it yet, but good things take time. At least with CU there's a legit reason for it taking longer than an Unreal Engine mod.

Honestly, I've thought the beta was going to start in 2 or 3 months for the better part of a year and a half now. I've pretty much stopped following the progress and testing. I'll pick it back up again closer to launch.

it's kinda like the same thing that is said time and time again in the car scene... fast,cheap or reliable you can only have two! most crowdfunded games im willing to donate to,I do so because they are willing to do things others are not the more ambitious the ideas the more set backs and delays i expect.

As a person who has built a thing or two due to many of my hobbies or past hobbies just about everytime i thought ehhh i'll be done in 20 mins and it will be cake,well 45 mins later and having to try something different clearly i was wrong lol

why people want fresh ambitious games and expect them fast i'll never understand,everytime i have doubted anything about CU i have seen something to show me this is why i gave you my money and i cant say that about any other crowd funded game.

it's kinda like the same thing that is said time and time again in the car scene... fast,cheap or reliable you can only have two! most crowdfunded games im willing to donate to,I do so because they are willing to do things others are not the more ambitious the ideas the more set backs and delays i expect.

As a person who has built a thing or two due to many of my hobbies or past hobbies just about everytime i thought ehhh i'll be done in 20 mins and it will be cake,well 45 mins later and having to try something different clearly i was wrong lol

why people want fresh ambitious games and expect them fast i'll never understand,everytime i have doubted anything about CU i have seen something to show me this is why i gave you my money and i cant say that about any other crowd funded game.

People expected things much faster based on the developers' own publicized expectations, not out of thin air. That's where the frustration comes from. Take peoples' money, tell them that Beta 1 is expected in February of 2015, and still not have an answer as to when it's going to be 2.5 years later...Yeah, that's on them, not the backers.

As others have said... the point that sets CU apart is that they offer refunds. Delays suck, but unlike other games like the recently delayed CoE, you can get your money back if you think the delay is unreasonable or you lose interest.

You're correct.... to a point. You will get a refund until such a time as there is a massive exodus. Why? If there was a similar decent to something like SC, you'd see them close it. Not only because it cuts into their bottom line, but because it could mean that they could lose their ability to perform credit card transactions in the future, or suffer severe penalties like jacked transaction rates. To this point people haven't fallen out of love with the project and still give the developer more slack than any other project, possibly, in the history of gaming so would that happen? Who knows. You brought up CoE as an example, but this game is actually further behind than CoE even is and yet no commentary on it whatsoever.

You have no no evidence that refunds would be cut off. None whatsoever. What is a FACT is that if you want your money back from CU you request it and get it.

What is a FACT is that COE does not allow refunds even after massive delays and inability to deliver product.

Thats a huge difference and it's a FACT not an opinion. You answered your own question about why one company catches shit for delays and the other catches much less. The other is that the CU developer actually apologizes for delays and shows humility and seems like a likable guy. The COE developer comes off as unlikable, arrogant, shit on his customers that dared to question his ridiculous timeline and never apologized but rather blamed customers and prospective employees for his year plus delay.

These are reasons why CU "gets a pass".

PS: This doesn't excuse MJ or CU for being so far behind. It's embarrassing. But it explains the different receptions the two games get.

Post edited by Slapshot1188 on August 2017

"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator

Starvault's reponse to criticism related to having a handful of players as the official "test" team for a supposed MMO: "We've just have another 10ish folk kind enough to voulenteer added tot the test team" (SIC) This explains much about the state of the game :-)